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Five Turkish soldiers wounded in PKK
roadside bomb attack in SE Turkey
28.9.2011 |
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September
28, 2011
DIYARBAKIR, The Kurdish region of Turkey,
— Five Turkish soldiers were injured in a roadside
bomb attack in the southeastern Kurdish province of
Tunceli, daily Hürriyet reported on its website
Wednesday.
Soldiers were en route to respond to a kidnapping
and arson attack by alleged members of the outlawed
Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, near the Pülümür
district in Tunceli.
PKK members barricaded the road between Tunceli and
Erzincan provinces near Pülümür district and
kidnapped a pro-Turkish government village guard
named İsmail Gürbüz. |
Five Turkish soldiers wounded in PKK roadside bomb
attack in SE Turkey. Photo: DHA |
The militants also took
two petrol tankers to a nearby avalanche tunnel and
set them on fire,www.ekurd.netcausing
extensive damage to the tunnel.
Two civilians, including a child, and three Kurdish
PKK rebels were killed in a clash between
separatists and police in southeast Turkey,
authorities and security sources said Tuesday, AFP
reported.
The conflict occurred Monday night in the
southeastern Kurdish province of Batman, when
Turkish police units followed a car in the city
centre they suspected was carrying members of PKK,
security sources said.
Clashes between Kurdish rebels and Turkish security
forces have escalated recently, causing civilian
deaths.
Earlier this month, four people died in the Kurdish
city of Semdinli in southeast Turkey, while four
others were killed in Siirt when rebels opened fire
on a civilian car during an attack to a police
college.
Since August 17,
Turkish jets carried out air strikes against the
Kurdish PKK separatist group's bases in
Iraqi Kurdistan region,
the latest
raid being on
Friday, under justification of chasing elements of the
anti-Ankara PKK, forcing large numbers
of Kurdish citizens of those areas to desert their home
villages, including
an air raid that
killed 7
Kurdish civilians in a village north
of Kurdistan’s Sulaimaniyah city on August 21st.
Since it was established in 1984, the PKK has been
fighting the Turkish state, which still denies the
constitutional existence of Kurds, to establish a
Kurdish state in the south east of the country, sparking a conflict that has claimed some 45,000
lives.
But now its aim is the creation an autonomous
Kurdish region
and more cultural rights for ethnic Kurds who
constitute the greatest minority in Turkey,
numbering more than 20 million. A large Turkey's
Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK rebels.
PKK's demands included releasing PKK detainees,
lifting the ban on education in Kurdish, paving the
way for an autonomous democrat Kurdish system within
Turkey, reducing pressure on the detained PKK leader
Abdullah Öcalan, stopping military action against
the Kurdish party and recomposing the Turkish
constitution.
Turkey refuses to recognize its Kurdish population
as a distinct minority. It has allowed some cultural
rights such as limited broadcasts in the Kurdish
language and private Kurdish language courses with
the prodding of the European Union, but Kurdish
politicians say the measures fall short of their
expectations.
The PKK is considered as 'terrorist' organization by
Ankara, U.S., the PKK continues to be on the
blacklist list in EU despite court ruling which
overturned a decision
to place the Kurdish rebel group PKK and its
political wing on the European Union's terror list.
Copyright ©, respective
author or news agency,
hurriyetdailynews.com | AFP | ekurd.net | Agencies
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